Portrait of Diana Mary Barker

Benjamin West wanted to make a name for himself as a painter of grand historical pictures, but he first rose to international prominence as a portraitist. This painting, done three years after West settled in London, reveals the artist's debt to Sir Joshua Reynolds. The careful modeling, high degree of finish and smooth surface, and the elegant pose and setting reflect the neoclassical manner of Reynolds currently in vogue. The sitter, seventeen-year-old Lady Diana Mary Barker, resided at Speen House in Berkshire, England.